


Hollow Lullabies

by PumpkinPrincess



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Elder God, Eldritch, Harry Potter as Death, Master of Death Harry Potter, Other, Resurrection, Summoning, Summoning Circles
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-03
Updated: 2018-11-08
Packaged: 2019-08-11 06:08:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16470203
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PumpkinPrincess/pseuds/PumpkinPrincess
Summary: No one could have predicted that this eldritch thing would answer the summons, especially since it was supposed to bring back another Harry Potter, one who had already defeated Voldemort permanently, and not the incarnation of death itself, but since when did anything work out the way it was meant to in Harry's life.





	1. Summoning

For nearly two years Harry James Potter had studied meticulously. He had poured himself into the task of memorizing the eldritch language, eerie guttural inflections, and complex, bizarre runes from the deepest wells of knowledge the great hidden library of Salazar Slytherin had to offer.

It was madness to even think of attempting this but his desperation had been stewing for so long, desperately trying to prove to himself to the Order since Voldemort's resurrection. At first, he would not have attempted this even if it was the catalyst to end the Apocalypse itself, but Voldemort had returned from death more powerful and terrifying than ever before.

Three years ago, Harry had woken up screaming in agony as the horcrux reformed in his scar, ripping his scar open, a streak of white forming in his hair at the start of it from the sheer pain and power of the dark soul resurrecting inside him. He warned them all, of course he did, but they all thought him crazy. For sixteen months they let him slowly start to believe that he really was going insane while they knew the truth of his words the whole time, for Voldemort hadn't been the only one resurrected that night. He had walked in on an Order meeting twenty months ago to learn how they'd been lying to him, and he still had not spoken more than a few curt words with anyone since, resurrected or not, unsure of who he could even trust.

Two months later, he had discovered the ritual, which he brought to their attention regardless of his own views of them as people. A ritual to pull a guide from another dimension entirely, a vanquisher of Voldemort from another world. The decision was unanimous in regards to the foolishness of attempting this ritual. The matter was forgotten by all but Harry himself.

Harry, who spent the next eighteen months preparing for tonight.

He had crafted the ritual space with his own hands. Clearing the chamber of secrets of debris; blasting the dust, mold, grime, and obvious years of disuse from every stone; polishing its flattened surfaces until they gleamed and shined like mirrors. He carved the ritualistic circles and complex runes into the floor by hand, each rune drawn exactly so, filling the crevices with molten silver, sanding and polishing them smooth, exactly as level as the rest of the chamber floor. It was made of more than a thousand runes, the smallest of them no larger than the head of a pin, the largest nearly taking up half the room itself. Each was part of another, larger symbol, a chain of runes and sprials, all of them culminating into an ancient summoning ritual.

He had poured and molded the candles himself, thick waxy black columns, each exactly a foot tall. He'd grounded the basilisk's skeleton to dust, mixed it into the dark wax as he created them. When lit the flames would burn purple, poisonous as the basilisk's venom had been. He had drawn incantations in sharp strokes on their surfaces as well.

In the center of the chamber sat his alter. The altar weighed nearly four hundred pounds, a thick two foot circle slab of obsidian upon a tripod of thick silver legs, polished to shine, the surface etched with silver runes just as the marbled floor of the chamber. He had not been able to use magic to float it in, too wary of mixing magic, so he had crafted it in the chamber after shoving and carrying the materials down the opening, down the pipe, and dragging them into the chamber over several weeks. The original pieces, before he crafted the alter by hand and as little magic as he could, had weighed over seven hundred pounds all together, which he had to bring into the chamber in pieces and shards at an average of twenty to ninety pounds each.

It was a shame no one would ever witness his efforts, for anyone he could tell would stop him before it could be completed. His secrets would be worth it though, his hard work not wasted, when he came to them with his guide. Eventually they would forgive and forget his betrayal, his sneaking about, when they won the war with the help of his actions.  
  
Harry steped to the center of the chamber, picking up his wands from the alter. Twin cores if not twin wands like the ritual required. Suggested, rather, for his holly and his nemesis' yew wand worked well enough so far. It had been difficult, to say the least, nearing impossible, to get his hands on Voldemort's wand. It made him momentarily curious about the dark lord's current wand, but he decided just as quickly that it was not really important in the end.

He lit the candles one at a time, starting closest to the door then lighting them reverse clockwise. The purple flames flickered to life like small poisonous flowers, thin plumes of grey-violet smoke rose from the burning wicks in thin wispy spirals. Candles lit and ritual started, Harry set the wands down and picked up the long moonstone dagger from the center of the alter. Wincing from the pain, he used the sharp stone blade to cut open each of his arms from the middle of his palms to the crook of his elbow, deep enough to draw blood but not so deep as to sever his ability to hold things.

Hands slick with blood, it was difficult to grasp the wands again, but Harry did it anyways. His voice echoed as he spoke in the ancient immeasurable language of the universe, guttural growling runes spoken in an authoritarian manner, as if he was trying to prove his worth to the universe itself. The flames flickered and lashed out, the runes lit up under his feet. The ground shook and cracked, thin fissures appearing in the smoothed out stone. His blood dripped from his arms and filled the thin cracks, an offering to unfathomable forces of magic. It ran through in streams of red, pouring too fast, too much, his blood pulled out to feed the spell meant to be cast by three or more. Harry shook from the strain on his magic and bloodloss but he did not waver, he did not back down.

The runes turned purple, their dim light brightening to near blinding intensity. Harry squinted but he kept his eyes open. A thousand eyes opened, felt and unseen, trained on him, watching from the void. They burned into him. Harry's chanting faltered as blood started to pour from his mouth, but he did not let it sway him, and he continued his incantation through the blood.

The candles all of a sudden flickered out, melting in an instant, the hot wax splashed on the floor, across the alter in scalding grey that cooled to the dark black hard wax upon the floor. The wands were ripped from his hands, thrown across the room where they clattered as they hit the wall and rolled away. Thick violet smoke filled the chamber, vision fading in the periphery. It filled his lungs, crawling down through his mouth and choking him as he spoke in raspy determination, refusing to bow down.

Footsteps thudded as others came into the chamber. Harry suspected that they had discovered his intent and Ron had likely mimicked parseltongue again to open the chamber. The ritual circle kept them out, amethyst flames created a wall of cold fire to keep them from interfering.

"Harry stop!" He heard someone cry, but it was too late.

A sound flooded into him, the sound of a sword singing through the air amplified infinitely, the cry of a thousand dying sparrows, the shrieking of a soul ripped to shreds. The sound was indescribable, eldritch, and ancient, and Harry felt his very soul being ripped apart, the agony of his very existence undone and reformed atom by atom. It rang in his head, loud as cathedral bells, shaking him apart like a badly made porcelain doll.

When the creature steped out from the void Harry could not be sure if he screamed, or if the sound trapped itself in his throat like leaves clogged in a storm drain, but some one screamed, one of the many who ran so foolishly into the room.


	2. Death

Harry forced his body to stay still, forced himself remain rooted in the spot, to stay standing even as a pressure tried to force him to his knees. He forced his eyes to behold the horror he had foolishly unleashed upon their dimension.The creature turned its many eyes upon Harry, the only one not curled in a fetal ball sobbing for forgiveness as far from the thing as possible.

It was vaguely humanoid, in a subtle way that was barely there, skeletal but difficult to describe, human words lacked the proper way to describe it fully. For the most part it was fluid shifting shadows, almost fifty feet tall, crouched in the basement and trapped by the ancient magic. It's face was right in front of Harry's own, white as bone, rows upon rows of too sharp fangs, and pools of purple fire for eyes. It's tongue flicked out, black, too long, pointed, and Harry is bathed in frosty cemetery breath as it's tongue almost licked him, so close, but never touching. On it's back, decorated with more purple eyes, a huge pair at the pair at the top a hoard of normal human sized ones near the tips, are wings, half butterfly, half bat. It's left arm was a scythe black as it's shadows and edged in glowing green. It's right arm was humanesque, snow white, seven long black claws at the tips of it's fingers. The creature had a set of six horns, curled and jagged up near its face amid the black liquid fire of its hair, like Harry couldn't already tell it was a demonic entity of fear and old magic without them.

Harry forced himself to stand taller. The sound rang out, louder this time, and Harry abruptly realized that the creature was attempting to communicate. Perhaps it expected Harry to understand, but the ritual gave no clarity. Or perhaps it knew Harry could not understand and it was showing him how unprepared he was. It didn't matter. His ears bled. He stuttered out a hysterical sound meant to be a laugh but that came out as a sob.

"Do you speak English?" He asked. His voice didn't tremble, his words came out unstuttered, but cracked, and hoarse.

"Silly mortal," it said in an eerily familiar voice that seemed too whispery, echoey, and deep, but it was still Harry's voice. He wondered if the creature taking his voice is meant to be a comfort or if it was meant to unnerve him. If it wad the latter, it worked all to well. "You overreach. Messing with things beyond your simple comprehension."

In that moment he was lifted into the creatures hand, sat upon it like a mockery of a throne, staring into an eye larger than himself.

"I could eat you." It said out loud, but in his head he felt something desperate, and Harry tugged on the feeling until it was recognizable.

Images filled his head, his body disintegrated from the touch, then his body reformed in screaming agony. It had been so long since this lonely creature touched anyone, anything, without it disintegrating into ashes, it's soul obliterated by this creature's touch. It had expected Harry to turn to ash at his touch. It was meant to be a punishment, to be killed and reborn over and over until he apologized for daring to summon this creature. Harry had to force himself not to sob and shake visibly from the sheer sympathy he felt, and he felt a wave of surprised gratefulness through the odd bond. He felt accepted, the bond snapped into existence like being dropped into a warm bath. His scar, in contrast, ripped open in a way eerily similar to the way it had three years earlier, when Voldemort and the others were resurrected.

"My name is Harry." He said aloud for the others to hear, but he suspected it would have heard his thoughts. "What's your name?"

The creature chuckled, or Harry thought it was a chuckle, but it was more of a gargled glass death rattle than anything recognizable as a laugh. "My name is older than the universe, unintelligible to mortal ears."

What came out next was static and rumbling and an ominous ringing like nothing he had heard before, the others quaked in fear and agony though Harry didn't feel affected even though he was closest. The creature tilted it's big head to the side and then it licked the blood off his face as it trickled from his open bleeding scar and mouth. The action healed the wound instantly.

"You may call me Death, my mortal, my master." It said.

Death. Harry paled, and he wasn't the only one affected by the words. He suspected that he should have had a harder time believing it, but faced with the eldritch abomination he couldn't help but believe it. Dumbledore appeared to have a stroke, a few fainted, and he even saw someone piss himself. There was something oddly satisfying about their fear in the face of his own pseudo fearlessness.

"I am not your master." He told the creature, Death. The ritual made them equals, or Death his master, not the other way around. "I returned the wand to Dumbledore and I lost the resurrection stone."

It made the odd chuckling noise again. "But you didn't destroy them, and no one else has owned all three since you, sealing your fate." It said. "Do you see?"

"Yes." He answered shaking. "How do I reject it? I've no desire to master death. I only wanted a guide."

It shook its head sadly. "There is nothing you can do, little one." Death rumbled. "I have known that you'd be my master since your soul was created aeons ago. You should have been allowed a long boring life before you found out, but someone decided to mess with a ritual they didn't understand, and you foolishly decided summon a guide from beyond your boring plane of existence. Your spell work was immaculate but I will always be the one summoned when you need another, my mortal."

"My boy," came the voice of his headmaster, unexpected courage startling. He sounded so far away, like he was underwater. Harry looked down at him, trembling and terrified, and decided that he could get used to the view. However, the fear was directed at Death, not Harry, as were his words. "We appreciate the journey you made, but we need to to go back to your own realm. Please let the ritual bring us another who would be better suited to the task."

Death made a noise, static thunder and magic dying, laughter. "You overstep." He hissed. "Only my master commands me."

Dumbledore looked to Harry, as if expecting him to follow his lead, and Harry couldn't help his smile. For the first time since their resurrection he was in charge of all of their fates. It was intoxicating.


	3. Author note

Hey everyone. So, i didn't expect this to be so popular. Actually I got on today expecting maybe 3 readers. I am in the middle of writing 2 stories for nanowrimo, and I only posted these chapters to get a feel for how the archive works. That said, as soon as November is over I will continue this since people are actually reading and enjoying this. Sorry for the delay, wish me luck, and thank you for reading. ~ Princess Lia


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